The Struggles of High School
by ClimbingCreature
Summary: This is an AU where The Hunger Games does not exist. Peeta is a high school senior and he is being bullied by the school jocks. He has no friends and he feels life is not worth living, until he meets Katniss Everdeen. A girl who has everything but also wants Peeta to find true happiness. Character creation credit to Suzanne Collins. WARNING: Actions of self harm and suicide.


Chapter One: The First Day

PEETA P.O.V.

I was walking into school; it might as well be a prison, for the first day of my senior year of high school. It seems like it had been decades since I started high school here for the first time all the way back in freshman year. It had not been a wonderful experience, my previous school I was friends with almost everybody but here it was the exact opposite. Here I had no friends; my teachers didn't even like me for God's sake. I wish my parents didn't follow their dreams; I wish that we could have stayed in our old house and not have to switch schools. I wouldn't be known as the baker's son, and I wouldn't be called "Bread Boy". That is what tweaked me the most, being called Bread Boy. The only person I could think of that might like me is Mags, she is the guidance counselor at our school. She liked me didn't she? If she did it is not saying much, she likes everybody. She only sees the good in people, even the people who are really, really bad.

"RIIIINGGGG" That was the bell, one of the most annoying sounds I had ever heard. It's time for my first class of the day, gym. I am a very short, skinny, athletically challenged guy so gym is not a fun class for me. I was just hoping that I didn't have class with any of the jocks who tormented me. Those were the only people who really bullied me; everyone else just ignored me or looked at me like I was a freak. The reason I was so alienated was because the jocks started picking on me the first day I started school and to this day they haven't stopped. Naturally that is going to make me depressed and not want to talk to many people. So it wasn't even my fault that I talked to no one.

As I did every year, when it was time for gym I always showed up to the locker room after I was sure everybody else would be changed. I quickly went into the locker room after I saw everyone else standing around the gym, switched from my pants to my shorts and changed into my athletic shirt. In the process I had to take my sweatshirt off in the process, which always made me cringe a little. I had cuts all across my arms because it was just an escape for me, I'm a cutter and I'm ashamed of it. Luckily whenever I was in public without my sweatshirt on, which was very rare, I was good at turning my arms so my cuts faced my body so no one could see. I then quickly darted out of the locker room into the open gym just so I could make sure no one that had seen me gone in would have enough time to follow me in and have me trapped. I hate living in fear.

As we were waiting for Coach Brutus, I was eyeing out who my classmates were. The people I noticed right away were my tormentors, Cato Cutler, Marvel Riddle, and Gale Hawthorne. Being one-hundred percent honesty, I was afraid of them and they knew it. They got a thrill out of the fact they could make me cower at the flick of their wrists, and they took every opportunity they could to instill that fear into me. A lucky day was considered a day when all they did was trip me in the hall and take my lunch money; leaving it at that. This rarely happened though, as I would always go home with bruises, cuts, scars, scabs, you name it. I hated that they had this power over me; it is why I always looked sad and why I would never talk to anybody. All this they knew, and they did it anyways because they loved that they could ruin a person. They truly were evil at its purist form.

There were plenty of other notable classmates in my gym class that were fairly well known in the school, for better or for worse. Glimmer Griffin and Clove Slayer were the first girls that I saw. They were the popular girls, almost every guy wanted them, but they would turn them all down. I thought they were bitches and didn't understand why everyone loved them so much, all they did was bash on people for their appearances and their inabilities. Finnick Odair and Annie Cresta were big ones too. They are head over heels in love with each other and everyone knew it. It's shocking to everyone they are not married yet, probably only aren't because they don't want to be labeled as "the trash that got married in high school". I thought they were nice; I just didn't ever have the chance to speak to them. Finally there was Katniss Everdeen, the girl who had the perfect life. She had everything; friends, dates, good times, and so much more. Everyone loved Katniss because she was very charismatic and loved all types of people. Of course she never talked to me, no one did. There were tons of other people in my class but I barely knew any of them, it looked like a class of about twenty.

Throughout the whole gym class we just had a conditioning day, so we just used workout equipment the whole class. I didn't mind this since it didn't require me to use my terrible coordination skills. The whole class Cato, Marvel, and Gale kept looking over at me and giving me the most evil smiles and occasionally waving at me but never saying hi to me. It was making me nervous because I had no idea what they were going to do the second they got up close to me. Class was ending and we had to go change to get ready for the rest of the day. Naturally I was going to stay and talk to Coach Brutus for a few minutes to make sure no one else was changing when I went to do the same.

"Hi Coach." I said this while interrupting him while he was putting all the equipment away that everyone else had neglected to put away. "Oh, hello Peeta." He said this without even looking at me. He didn't really like me and I feel like it was because I didn't play football like the other guys in my class. "How do you think I did in the workouts today?" I said in a very upbeat tone, or at least that is what I was going for. "About as good as I was expecting." That's nice; he can't even pretend to be nice to me. It was the first day and already he couldn't hold back how much he hated it. "Oh… well I'm going to go change now." I said in the most awkward tone, I didn't know how to have a normal conversation with him. "You do that." With that, I walked away from him. That conversation had gone about as well as I expected it to go. I had high hopes that maybe I could make teachers like me this year but I guess it just wasn't meant to be. By now it had been about five minutes since we were sent to change and the bell for the end of class had just rung so everyone would be gone. I changed into my pants and comfortable shirt and put my gym closes back into my locker. The hair on the back of my neck is standing up but I have no idea why. I quickly put my sweatshirt on and start heading for the door.

"Hey Bread Boy." I stop dead in my tracks as I hear Cato from behind me. As I turn around I am met by a heavy fist to my face and I fall onto the ground. Cato, Marvel, and Gale were all there, smirking at me as they looked at me on the ground. "Did you miss us over the summer?" Gale says as he looks down at me. He then picks me off the ground and shoves me against the row of lockers. I don't answer him; I just stare into his eyes with fear as the three of them create a tight circle around me with no chance for escape. "What's wrong you can't talk? Did we hurt the little baby?" Cato says in a fake apologetic voice. Gale throws me to the ground and the three of them start to kick me all over as hard as they can. This goes on for a good three minutes before it stops. I am looking around and think that it is over but as I look up Marvel and Gale pick me up and each restrains an arm while standing in front of me, Cato is standing behind me. As I am catching my breath from the pain of my whole body being stomped to death, the pain is now being substituted by my white briefs being pulled up to my neck. I let out a yelp of pain because it hurt my ass really bad.

"Awww, is Bread Boy hurt?" Cato said in the same, fake, apologetic voice. "You guys let go of him, I've got an idea." Marvel and Gale let go and Cato proceeded to lift me off the ground and carry me to the showers. I was struggling to get away but it was in vain, Cato was twice my weight and a good foot taller than me so I had no chance of escape. He was also a million times faster; so I just stopped struggling because I would need my energy to make it through this and the rest of the day. "Which one of you has the duct tape?" Duct tape? What they hell did they need duct tape for? "I've got it right here." Marvel then started wrapping up my arms in duct tape behind me and then suddenly I knew what was going on. They were going to restrain me so I couldn't just get out of my pain the second they left. I kept making loud grunting noises from the pain I was in. "Shut up." Marvel snapped at me and put a piece of tape over my mouth.

"We're almost done Bread Boy; we want to make sure you are nice and comfortable." Cato said it so sarcastically it made me so angry; of course I wasn't going to show this anger towards them. If I did that they would take that as aggression and try to put me back in line and I didn't want that at all, I'm such a coward. Cato then hung me by the leg holes of my briefs on the towel racks underneath one of the shower heads. He then turned the cold water on full blast and I yelped in pain, but it was muffled because of my sealed shut mouth. They each then gave me one last, hard, punch to the stomach and left. "RIIIINGGGG" Shit, that was the bell for the next class to start. I was going to be late to just my second class on the first day. I kept struggling to get myself off the hook because from there I knew I could cut my hands free. Every time I tried to get out though, my briefs lodged themselves tighter against my ass and the shock of the cold wasn't helping. After about ten minutes, Coach Brutus walked into the locker room and saw me. He gave me the biggest look of disgust.

"God damn it Mellark." He pulled me off the hook, which sent a little more pain through my body and then quickly turned the water off. He used his keys to cut my arms free and ripped the tape off of my mouth. I quickly removed my wedgie and the immediate relief I felt was the best thing that happened so far today. I quickly was brought back to reality when Coach Brutus threw a towel at me. "Peeta, if you bulked up and stopped being so weak you wouldn't be a target for bullies." This comment made me so mad and I couldn't hold it back anymore because he was a teacher and I had doubts he would hurt me. "Well if your nephew and his fucking goons had respect for other human beings maybe this wouldn't happen!" Cato was Coach Brutus's nephew and Cato's football coach so you couldn't, or at least shouldn't, say anything bad about Cato when Coach Brutus was near. "Don't you talk like this was his fault; you probably provoked him or something! Now dry off and go to your next class, I'm sure there is a detention slip there that is waiting for you."

He then left and I started drying off until I was just a little damp, nothing I couldn't live with. I exited the locker room and started walking towards my English class, trying to figure out what I was going to say to Mr. Abernathy as soon as I got there. I stepped into class and everyone turned to me and snickered, except for Mr. Abernathy. My cheeks started to turn red because I knew I was late and I was still noticeably damp. "How nice of you to join us Peeta, would you care to explain why you arrived twenty minutes late?" I started to look around the room and then my eyes met Gale's. He just stared at me and then made an imaginary slit across his throat with his thumb. I thought for a moment and finally said, "I didn't want to come." That was it? That is the best excuse I could come up with on the spot? This was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life and I wanted it to be over soon. "Well you can come to detention after school then since you didn't want to during class. Now sit down and stop causing distractions." With that, I started walking towards the only open desk. I didn't think much about but then I saw that it was right in front of Gale. Great, now for the rest of the year Gale is going to be right behind me and I will have no idea what he is going to do next. I was only through two classes so far and I have the same eight classes every single day. I was so screwed.

The period dragged on and nothing was happening, but then Gale started kicking my seat and wouldn't stop. I turned around to glare at him but he just met me with a smirk. "What are you going to do about it Bread Boy?" Nothing, I was going to do nothing because I couldn't. I was the pathetic Bread Boy that was easy to pick on and because of that my universal role was to be bullied. I just decided to turn away; I didn't want to cause anymore confrontation with Gale or that crew today. I would try to avoid them at all cost.

"RIIIINGGGG" Class was over; I got up, grabbed my bag and quickly bolted out the door in a rushed walk just so I could maybe get away from Gale. When I turned back to look at him he smirked at me with that evil look in his eyes.

As my day continued on it was pretty uneventful. I didn't have any of the jocks in any of my next three classes. I was fully dry by the end of the fifth period, which was a light in the dark tunnel of my day, and it was time for lunch. I stepped up to my locker and started dialing the combination. "12…3…74" I said this in a hushed whisper to myself as I opened my locker, it was hot so as I put my chemistry book away I pulled my sweatshirt off and put it in with my book. Of course, I made sure not to let anybody see my scars from the cuts I had made. Putting the lock back on my locker, I then turned around to head for lunch. I was suddenly pushed back against my locker and was lifted to my tiptoes so I was face to face with a very stern and angry looking Cato, Marvel and Gale standing beside them of course. The three of them made a ring around me with my locker as the fourth wall so there was nowhere for me to go.

"You know Bread Boy; it is rude to run away from people when class ends." He was obviously talking about how I hurried away from Gale at the end of second period. My eyes darted to Gale who was looking at me just as stern as Cato was, as was Marvel when I looked over to him. "This can go very smoothly or it can be difficult Bread Boy, it's your call. Give us that ten dollar bill and maybe we will only hit you a few times to the face." Cato said this with such seriousness, trying to instill the fear of God in me and it was working. I looked between Cato and Marvel and my eyes connected with a girl with short blonde hair who was walking with a taller boy with his arm around her shoulder. As she walked by, our eyes did not break apart and I could tell she felt sorry for me but obviously she wasn't going to do anything to stop what was happening.

Our school divided lockers based off of grade and all the seniors were in their own hallway on the fourth floor and since mostly just seniors took classes at this level, it was just my senior class witnessing my torment. Everybody saw but they just ignored it and pretended that what was happening to me was nonexistent, that is by far what hurt the most. The fact that no one would dare stop and try and help me really hurt me inside. I looked down in shame and slowly lifted my ten up Cato and he quickly snatched it from my hands. I gave a quick glance up and he was looking at it with such pride.

"Hey guys, look!" Marvel had a moment of realization and quickly grabbed my arm and turned it so that my scars were facing up for them to see. They all took pride in this and enjoyed the shame I felt from this. I just then looked down and worked really hard to fight back tears. No one had ever seen my scars and the fact that the people who essentially put them there were the first to see them, it was the worst feeling in the world. "He's got them on that arm too." Marvel said as he pointed to my other arm with a big grin on his face. "Oh my God, how funny is that?" Gale said this while laughing at me. He then grabbed my through and pushed my head against the locker. He applied some pressure as he said, "it's almost as if he wants to die."

People were stopping now to see what was happening, pretending to be doing something else but really they were there for the show. Everyone likes to watch the strong prey on the weak, it is how life works. No one seemed thrilled about what was happening but they certainly didn't look extremely sad for me, most just were interested more than anything. A couple of tears started to stream down my face and I just looked at the ground as Gale let go of my throat. I then had my head lifted up by my hair and Cato leaned in so close to me one of us could of bit the other if we wanted too, but obviously I wouldn't do that. He looked me dead in the eyes; I had no idea what he was going to do.

"You should just kill yourself already because no one would miss a worthless piece of shit like you if you were gone." That did it, I was crying now. Tears were pouring out of my eyes and I couldn't make them stop if my life depended on it. My eyes were closed and my head was bent because Cato had let go of my hair. I kept breathing heavily because I couldn't handle the stress of what was happening to me. I could only hear muffled, hurried conversation from the spectators who were scattered around the hall and listening but mostly all I hear were Cato, Marvel, and Gale. Worthless, unloved, disgusting, pathetic, shrimp, pussy, bitch, faggot, that was all that I was hearing from them and I just wanted it to stop.

"What kind of fucking problem do you all have?" Katniss Everdeen said that. Who was she talking to? I looked up only to see that she was between Cato and Gale and looking at all three of them with absolute hatred. What was she doing? "We were just talking to Bread Boy." I couldn't believe he could just lie like that. "Yeah, bullshit that is all you were doing." Katniss stepped up beside me while I was still crying, because Marvel and Gale let go of my arms I buried my face in my hands so no one could see me. Katniss then wrapped an arm around my back and onto my shoulder and placed the other on the arm closest to her body. "Come on Peeta, I'm going to take you to Mags." She said as she led me away.

"It's going to be okay Peeta, it's okay. You're going to be okay." She said this with such reiteration but it definitely wasn't going to be okay, nothing in my life was ever going to be 'okay'. "No it's not Katniss." I said through muffled sobs and loss of air in my lungs because I wouldn't stop crying. "Nothing will ever be okay." "Stop it." She said almost instantly after I spoke. "Stop talking like that, you're going to be fine. You understand me?" I didn't answer her, I just kept crying as she led me into Mags's office. "Mags, Peeta needs to come in here so he can escape the curious eyes of the school. I think he may also want to talk at some point if he feels inclined to." She almost read my mind for God's sake. "Alright, sit down Peeta." She said as she grabbed my other hand and sat me down with Katniss. "Katniss dear, can you bring up some lunch for Peeta to have? We might be here a while and he is bound to get hungry. What do you want Peeta?" She said this while directing her attention to me. "A tuna sandwich would be fine but I don't have my money anymore." Katniss looked at me with a smile and said, "Don't worry; I have a few extra bucks that should cover it." She smiled at me again and walked out to go get my lunch, as well as hers I would assume.

My crying had almost stopped but a few tears kept leaving my eyes as I looked at my hands that I was now twiddling together. "Peeta, what is the matter? Remember, you can tell me anything you desire to." Mags certainly was right, I could tell her anything and everything. What would the consequences be though? Even if Cato, Marvel, and Gale all got expelled, they could still do whatever they wanted to me. I walked to and from school every day because it was only a five minute walk but in those five minutes they could come up on me and do whatever they wanted, maybe even kill me. No, I couldn't tell her anything. It feels like a matter of life and death and I choose life, despite not wanting to choose life in the past. Katniss came back with a tuna sandwich from the cafeteria minutes later and handed it to me while she ate a peanut butter and jelly. I ate my sandwich until it was completely gone. Being full made me feel a little bit better, but it barely did.

"Peeta," Mags finally said, "I don't know how I am going to help you if you don't tell me what is wrong. I promise you, nothing will leave this room unless you want it to. Katniss seemed eager to say everything but I gave her a pleading look with fear in my eyes and she retracted. "Katniss, why don't you go back to lunch and I will take care of Peeta. I promise you, he is safe here." Katniss looked a little disappointed, probably because she knew what the problem was but wouldn't say anything without my permission. She gave me a pained look but said, "Okay." With that, she left to go back to lunch.

"Peeta there is nothing wrong with admitting something is wrong or that you need help. Asking for help is the first step towards happiness when you are stuck in a black hole." Mags really did have a way with words, but I was not interested in talking. I just wanted my first day to be over so I could go home and sleep till tomorrow. "I appreciate the offer Mags. Trust me, I do, but I don't want to talk about it. I will just deal with it my own way." She just looked at me for a couple moments but finally spoke. "Alright. Well if you don't want to talk about what is making you sad, do you want to talk about what you did this summer?" Not in particular, my summer was boring because I was just watching TV and speaking to essentially no one the whole time. She seemed like she wanted to talk to me though, not really sure why, so I just nodded with approval.

With that, we just talked for the rest of the day about what I did during the summer mostly. She described her summer a little bit but it was mostly her asking the questions. At the end of the day Mags let me leave a few minutes early so I could get out of the school right as the bell rang. It rang just as I opened the doors to leave and I rushed home so I wouldn't have to meet anybody's eyes. Everyone obviously would know what had happened by now, it is how things went. When someone's misfortunes happened, they were going to be known. This would be even truer because Cato, Marvel, and Gale would no doubt be gloating about it, how they made a pussy cry for his mommy.

I reached the safety of my home and closed the door behind me. I stood with the door to my back before I quickly kicked my shoes off and headed up stairs. My parents were still working at the bakery that was attached to our house and my brothers Ruben and Batch were probably not going to come home from college today in the middle of the week so I had the house to myself. I quickly ran upstairs and closed my bedroom door behind me and locked it. I sat down on the floor and pulled out my cutting knife. I stared at it in disbelief for a few seconds then pushed down hard on my left forearm as hard as I could till it broke the skin and I just dragged it to make the cut deeper. I did this several times on both arms until I was lightly breathing and my mind was mostly focused on my cuts and not my emotional pain. I went into the bathroom and washed off the initial blood and then wrapped them up with medical tape from the medicine cabinet.

As I walked back into my room I realized I wasn't hungry and decided it would be better if I just went to sleep for the rest of the day. It was five o'clock but a good twelve hours couldn't hurt could it? I wrote a note saying that I went to bed because I was super exhausted and wouldn't be coming to dinner. After taping it to the outside of my door, I closed it and then locked it so no one would disturb me in the middle of my sleep. I stripped down till I was just in my briefs, preparing to go to bed. I noticed they were stretched out from the wedgie I had suffered early in the day, I quickly felt a little of the pain I had suffered from earlier and pulled them off. I then found a new pair and put them on and looked at the full body mirror on my door. I looked normal, aside from my bandaged arms, everything about me looked normal. I sighed because this was far from the truth and quickly climbed under my covers, closed my eyes and went to sleep.


End file.
